Love and Other Unknown Variables (20 page)

5.8

I
’m driving to Greta’s for our annual New Year’s movie marathon. The sign in Mrs. Dunwitty’s yard catches my eye, even though I try to avoid it. The garden is shrouded in frost. And her house is—

“What the hell?”

I slam on the brakes and swerve for the curb. I stamp up to her porch to stare at the offending door. How could they? Dimwit would be mad. No, pissed. Mrs. Dunwitty’s once flamingo-pink door has been painted a respectable hunter green.

I fish out my cell phone as I jog back to my car.

“Where does Mrs. Dunwitty’s son live?”

“What?” Dad asks.

“You said he put her in an old folks’ home. I want to wish her a Happy New Year. Where is she?”

“Hold on,” he says. “I just got a Christmas card from Bill. I’ll find his address.”

Mrs. Dunwitty’s son lives two towns over. Luckily for me, it’s a town even punier than mine with only one retirement joint in the whole place right on the main strip. I pull into the parking lot, all screeching wheels and nervy driving.

I haven’t thought through what I’m about to do which is why my mind still hasn’t caught up to my body’s actions. Obviously, or I’d be sitting at Greta’s stuffing my face with popcorn instead of parking across two spots at a retirement home.

Still on autopilot, I leave the car and walk through the automatic doors that sigh
shush
as they open and close. Inside the door is a mahogany reception desk the size of Texas. My brain catches up and puts the brakes on my whole adrenaline-driven trip.

The receptionist smiles at me, a smear of pink lipstick on her left front tooth. I’m frozen on the entry mat so the automatic doors are
shush
ing like mad behind me. Open, close, open, close. Gusts of frozen wind blow in around me. The receptionist’s smile fades as she waves me in.

“Well come on now, sugar. You’re letting the cold air in,” she says, her polished southern accent and big hair making it okay for her to call a complete stranger “sugar.”

“Sorry,” I mutter and step away from the doors. They come to a close with a final
shush
. I can feel my ears burning and my palms are sweaty so I wipe them on the front of my jeans and shift from one foot to the other. “Um, I’m…um.”

Looking around I can see the Graceful Oaks Retirement Home is ready for a rip-roaring New Year’s Eve. Paper streamers and balloons are stuck to the beige walls. I move closer to the giant desk, dwarfing myself with each step. The receptionist is wearing a glittery top hat.

The brass nameplate at the desk tells me my sparkly receptionist is Debbie. Debbie looks like she hopes the
shush
ing doors open again so a winter wind can take me away. I try once more. “I’m here to see Mrs. Dunwitty.”

Debbie’s eyes widen. “Is she expecting you?”

“No,” I scoff and then regret it. Debbie doesn’t look impressed.

“Are you family?”

“Um. No. I’m her neighbor.”

Debbie looks dubious, her small eyes squinching together.

“I take care of her garden. Well, at first, I ran over her garden, then I took care of it.”

“Well,” she says, drawling the word out, “I’m not supposed to let unannounced guests—”

“I want to wish her a Happy New Year.” The words jumble out and land flat on her gigantic desk. “Please?”

“Sign in here,” she says, leaning forward like we’re co-conspirators. She points toward a set of double doors. “Room 112.”

Once inside, I take a huge breath to steady myself. I peek into an empty sitting room, furnished with squashy looking chairs and a television blaring some New Year’s celebration to an empty room. I notice a vase of roses set on a table in the back corner of the room. I duck in and grab it, and then speed-walk to room 112. I knock before my nerves can catch up. No immediate answer.

I knock again and call out, “Mrs. Dunwitty? It’s Charlie. Can I come in?”

“
May
I come in, Jack.” The response is quiet, but unmistakable. Just as a nurse rounds the corner, I push open the door and step into the darkened interior room.

I can barely make out Mrs. Dunwitty lying in her bed. She has shrunk, shriveled into this strange old woman. My smile twitches as I clutch the stolen flowers like a shield.

“These are for you,” I say, placing them next to her bed. She turns to look at them and her eyes, still clear and razor-sharp grow with horror.

“Those are the ugliest fucking flowers ever. Where did you steal those? You better have stolen them. Please do not tell a dying woman you paid good money for those crappy excuses for roses. Didn’t I teach you anything at all? Get them out of here.” Her voice, shaky at first from disuse, grows stronger and louder with each grievance. “O-U-T, OUT.” She points a thin finger toward the door as her body is overrun with a spasm of coughing.

I snatch the flowers and run from the room, tossing them in a trashcan across the hallway. When I come back in, she is sitting up in her hospital bed. It makes a sluggish whirring sound, like even the beds in this joint are fixing to die. She looks me over, her eyes squinting and making me squirm. Finally, she smiles, a wide smile in a too-small face. Skeleton smile.

“It’s good to see you,” she says and pats the edge of her bed for me to sit.

The last thing I want to do is sit on this woman’s bed, but I’m afraid another outburst like the last one will do her in. I sit.

“So what brings you here?” she asks, and I can see if I consider a lie, even a half-truth, she’ll smack the back of my head.

“They painted your door,” I say.

She is quiet for a moment. “What color?”

I don’t want to answer. Why am I here? What was I thinking? I stare at the wide white tiled floor.

“That bad, eh?” she says with a chuckle.

I nod.

“Well, it’s to be expected.”

My eyes get wide. “What? What’s to be expected? They painted your door boring, totally okey-dokie, covenant-approved green. How can you be so calm?”

“Charles, it isn’t my door. Not technically. Who’s going to buy a house with a pink door?”

“Plenty of people,” I snap. Mrs. Dunwitty looks at me with a funny half smile. “Okay, fine. Nobody would want to live in a house with a flamingo-ass door. Happy? You’re the only person that insane.” I’m laughing now and she’s laughing, too.

“That’s my boy.”

Our laughing quiets and her hand is sitting pale and gray on her blanket. I remember the way it looked as it dug in the fertile soil of her rose garden, holding the delicate roots of plants and coaxing them into the dirt to grow and thrive. Without thinking, I reach out and pick up her hand, so tiny and weak now, in my own.

“Everything has changed.” My voice hurts as it tumbles out from my throat.

“That’s how gardens grow. I thought we’d already covered that,” Mrs. Dunwitty says, squeezing my hand.

“Yeah, but the changes never stop, and I can’t keep up. Like I’m holding tightly to the strings of so many balloons, but they’re coming untied and blowing away, and I’m left with this horrible tangle of strings. I don’t know how to get free of them. You’re—” I break off and look for the words.

“Dying,” she offers.

The tears are beating the hell out of my eyes, working to chip away the tiniest hole in the dam. I focus on her ashen hand and the way it trembles as I hold it.

“Charles, I’m old. Surely you’ve noticed.” She’s trying to make me smile.

I close my eyes and steal a shallow breath. She called me Charles. Making light. I play along. “Mrs. Dunwitty, no offense, but I’m pretty sure you’re older than Moses.”

“That’s my boy,” she repeats. “What’s going on? Why are you making my dying days such a suckfest?”

“Excuse me? Suckfest?”

Mrs. Dunwitty’s eyes twinkle.

“All right. I guess I can tell you everything, seeing as how you’re going to die in, like, ten minutes, which means you can’t go blabbing it everywhere.”

“Oh, I can get a lot done in ten minutes.”

“I’m sure you can.” I spill everything. I tell her about Brighton and Ms. Finch. I tell her about Charlotte and how she’s dying, and I don’t know what to think because shouldn’t the world keep the good ones around as long as it can?

“I guess it seems like a big waste. She’s young and kind and beautiful and talented and…” I stop, waiting for the words. “Unfinished,” I finally say.

Her smile is sad this time. “Unfinished is ungood.”

I laugh, but the sound tastes bitter. “These are your words of wisdom? Unfinished is ungood? Is ungood even a word? Thought you were brilliant—had all the answers.”

“Always did say you weren’t as bright as everyone claimed,” she says, but then stops and inhales sharply. I look at her face, alarmed. Her eyes are closed and her face is screwed up in pain.

“Are you okay, Mrs. Dunwitty?” I don’t like the way her face keeps going gray. I don’t like the way her breath is rattling. “Do I need to get a nurse?”

“No, no nurses. I’m fine.” She closes her eyes and rests her head back against the pillow. “So tell me more. Have you talked to Charlotte about your feelings?”

I rub my nose. “Not really. When I mentioned her cancer, she punched me.”

Mrs. Dunwitty laughs so hard she starts coughing again. I get her some water and wait for her breathing to quiet. She takes a sip and says, “I like this girl.”

“You’re not the only one,” I admit.

I tell myself it’s a trick of the light when her eyes change from clear to cloudy, like heavy summer skies. “And another thing—kiss the girl, Jack. With your whole body and soul, you kiss her. Ain’t nothing like it. Worth all the risks. Worth all the pain to be in that one moment. Why, my Darryl…” She slips under the spell of her memories.

I grin and fake a cough.

She squeezes my hand. “Now,” she says, back to business. “If you’re done crying your wussy heart out, I’m feeling tired.”

I stand next to her bed, fighting down a wedge of fear in my throat. “Happy New Year, Mrs. Dunwitty,” I say and kiss her on the cheek.

She smiles. “Not me, Jack,” she says, touching the spot on her cheek where I kissed her. “The other one.”

5.9

D
riving home I make three New Year’s resolutions.

Resolution 1
: I pat the head of the angel Charlotte helped me place in Mrs. Dunwitty’s garden as I walk around to her backyard. There’s a can of flamingo-ass paint (not the official name on the can) in her old tool shed, and I know just what to do with it. I glance down the street at the dark houses, but no one is out. Mrs. Dunwitty’s house is abandoned, waiting for sale with its stupid green door.

I stand under the freezing stars at Mrs. Dunwitty’s and paint the door its proper color. My fingers are numb stubs, and my brush strokes are uneven, and the paint is freezing before it hits the door, but as the last seconds of this year slip away, I stand back and smile.

Now that’s more like it.

I toss the paint and brush in the trash heap in my trunk, nodding at the small, broken angel statue I still haven’t thrown away. But as soon as I’ve slammed it closed I remember Mrs. Dunwitty’s lesson on properly keeping your tools, so I open it up again and pull the brush out. I trudge around to the side of the porch where the water spigot hides behind an angry bush whose branches keep scraping at my hands as I rub the brush under the freezing water, watching the pink run off into a Pepto-Bismol puddle. I use my coat to dry off the brush and put it back in my trunk.

My hands are as pink as Mrs. Dunwitty’s door. Pink and cracking in the cold night air, stinging as much as the warm tears I refuse to cry. Now it’s finished. Finished is good.

---

R
esolution 2
: I find Becca reading in her nest of blankets when I get home. My insides feel like an army of ants has moved in, wriggling and scurrying every which way. “We need to talk,” I say, flopping down on her bed. If I thought it took balls to kiss Charlotte, it’s nothing compared to the bravery I’m summoning for this conversation. “I kissed Charlotte.”

Becca closes her book around a finger to save her place. “I know.”

Wow. Did not see that coming. “Did Charlotte tell you?”

Becca nods. “She said you kissed her and she kissed you back, but that it was a mistake and it wouldn’t happen again.”

Mistake? Of course, I get my feelings all sorted out, and completely forget that Charlotte may not feel the same way. My ears, neck, face, chest—it’s all on fire. Becca puts a hand on my shoulder and I’m surprised she doesn’t get burned.

“Of course she was lying about the mistake thing. She just said that to make me feel better.”

Relief washes over me. “The thing is, Bec, I want to kiss her again. I want to take her out on a date. I want to be her boyfriend. But I need to know it’s okay with you.”

She runs her thumb along the spine of the book. “Guess I’d be a pretty big bitch right now if I said it’s not.”

“No.” I lock my eyes with hers. “I need the truth.”

She twists a lock of her hair. “I do worry that you’ll fuck it up.”

“Becca!” Dad pops his head in her doorway, a bushy brow raised, “Don’t say that word. I nearly had a heart attack out here.” He puts a basket of clean laundry on her floor before ducking back out again.

Becca claps her hands over her mouth, her cheeks flushing.

“That’s what I told her, Dad,” I holler after him, and then grin at Becca. “Language, missy.” I
tsk
at her, shaking my head.

My sister laughs. For the first time, I notice how musical her laugh is. Not quite like Charlotte’s, but alive with sound. I’m pretty sure Becca didn’t laugh like that before Charlotte. Becca didn’t laugh at all.

“I worry I’ll fuck it up, too.” I’m careful to whisper the f-word.

“Dad!” Becca shouts. “Charlie said f—”

I smack her with a pillow to shut her up and we get to laughing again.

She quiets and sets her face in an old-fashioned Becca way—serious. “Does it feel like love, Charlie?”

In the wake of her question, I struggle to draw a breath.

Becca waits.

“Love is an awfully big word. Even bigger than cancer.”

She nods. “And there’s no cure for it either.”

I don’t know if it feels like love, but what I feel seems bigger than myself, like I can’t contain it no matter what I do. And the feeling seems to spill over into other areas of my life, like with that book. I fell for Atticus and all those characters. And I’m seeing all sorts of things about Becca I never took the time to notice. Things I really, really love.

I nudge her knee with mine. “I never appreciated how amazing you were before, Becca.”

She blushes three shades darker, twirling her hair. “I love you, too, Charlie.”

“And whatever you decide about Charlotte, I will respect.”

Becca laughs. “Oh, please. Like I could say no to that sappy love-sick face of yours. You’re worse than a puppy, you are.”

“So I can ask her out?”

“If you don’t, you might break her heart.” Becca’s smile is small, but pure.

I wrap an arm around her, squeezing her to my side. “Thank you, Bec.” I kiss the top of her head, and she swats me away. “So, how do I do this?”

---

R
esolution 3:
Becca says the reason cheesy romance movies always have characters doing the same lame crap over and over is because it works. She rattled off at least half a dozen stories in which the man comes to the woman’s window and woos her. We men have Romeo to thank for this lameness.

Becca confirms that Charlotte will be arriving home from her dad’s house the next day. When I reach Charlotte’s backyard that night, I crouch behind some scraggly bushes and scan the yard for the dog. There’s a crystalline layer of frost covering the grass like lace.

My fingers shake as I unlatch the gate, but I tell myself it’s just the coldness seeping in. Once inside, I find a few pebbles in the garden and poise myself under Charlotte’s window.

The first stone I toss ricochets off the siding with a
thwack
loud enough to wake the dead. I crouch low and look behind me, expecting a swarm of vampires or cannibals or, I don’t know, rabid-laser-toting squirrels on my ass at any second. When nothing happens, I toss the second rock. It lands on the roof and scuttles into the gutter. I find myself wishing Greta were here. She has better aim.

The third and fourth stones also miss. I’m out of stones. Desperate, I scan the yard and pick up a large pinecone. I give it a good heave. It arcs upward and makes a loud crunching noise as it smacks into Charlotte’s window.

“Yes!” I shout, and then toss myself flat into some bushes as the patio light flicks on.

“What in the hell do you think you’re doing?”

My heart flops around in my chest as I peek up from behind the bush. Charlotte is standing on the patio, a blanket pulled around her.

Jumping up, I wave. “Oh, uh, hi.”

“Hi?” Charlotte says, coming at me like a tachyon. “You could have woken my sister.” She grabs my elbow and pulls me back through the yard and shoves me through the open gate.

This isn’t the response Romeo got from Juliet. I watched the movie. This is not how it went.

“Wait, Charlotte, I want to ask you something.”

Charlotte closes the gate between us and looks at me, her jaw muscles tight. “Ask me what?”

“I’d like to take you on a proper date.”

Her hard expression melts, revealing the softer Charlotte beneath it. She arches one brow. “You know what a proper date looks like?”

“No, but Becca helped me with a plan.”

“Becca knows about dating?”

“Technically? No. But she reads more than me, so she says she’s got it all figured out.”

“I wasn’t sure you’d be back after our last…whatever that was,” she says, a hint of armor in her voice.

“Yeah, well, the dying thing scares the hell out of me.” Her hands tense around the fence. I kick at one of the slats in the gate. How do I put this so Charlotte won’t punch me, or sic her mean-ass dog on me? “I don’t mean to piss you off. It’s just last time, when we kissed it was so good and everything I wanted, but then I began to wonder what my life will look like when you’re dead and, well…you were there.”

“Dead chicks aren’t sexy?” she asks. I roll my eyes, which makes her snort. “Oh, but eye rolls
are
sexy.”

“Not as sexy as snorting,” I deadpan.

She pinches her lips together in response.

I take a deep breath and slide my fingers between hers. “Charlotte, when you go, I’ll be left here. You seem to think this puts me at an advantage, but you’re wrong because right now, you’re the most beautiful problem in my life. Compared to you, everything seems inconsequential.”

I’ve been staring at a fern twisting through the frosty mud at the base of the fence. I let my eyes flick upward to gage whether or not I need to duck or run. But Charlotte doesn’t look mad. Her eyes are big, sparkling from the porch light.

She leans over the gate between us, pressing her pink cheeks and perfect lips close to my ear. “Impress me, then,” she whispers before brushing my lips with hers. I lean forward, as she leans backward, a fish on a line, until the gate presses against my sternum.

“Charlotte.” I inadvertently groan as my body floods with want. When I open my eyes, she’s standing a foot away from the fence with a wicked grin. My face and ears burn despite the cold air.

“I thought you said it’d be a proper date. Shouldn’t the good night kiss come at the end?”

I nod, still flustered, and try to clear my throat. I have to take three big breaths before I can speak again. “Charlotte, would you go out with me this Friday?”